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Aqil Nejem
|birth=February 3, 2520 |death= |gender=Male |height= |hair=Black |eyes=Brown |cyber= |affiliation= (former) * |rank= |specialty= |battles= |status= |class= }} . You see us as warped and twisted children, tools of war forged from innocence and brainwashing. I beg to differ. I knew I wanted to be a soldier from the moment I saw the Covenant descending on my world like a plague of monstrous insects. I survived that hell because I was big enough to hold a gun and smart enough to shoot only when necessary. When the agent came and asked if I wanted revenge on the aliens, I didn't say yes because I was blinded by loss. I said yes because I wanted to. Is that so hard to understand? I was eight, but I was not stupid. There are others who were duped into the SPARTAN-III Program because they couldn't grasp what they were getting into. I do not, and shall not ever, count myself among them. So do not insult me by insisting that what makes me better than your arrogant compatriots also makes me some sort of inferior human being. I am, and have always been, exceptional. That is why I am still alive.|Spartan Aqil Nejem}} Aqil Nejem (service number 54273-98158-AN) was a SPARTAN-III supersoldier stationed aboard the UNSC Infinity. His military career began when he was eleven years old three years after his homeworld, Hat Yai, was attacked and rendered uninhabitable by the Covenant Empire; the SPARTAN-III Program recruited him early on due to his near-perfect combination of genetic superiority and high intelligence. As Aqil-A065, he trained rigorously and demonstrated early on traits which set him apart from most of the other Alpha Company candidates. He was removed from the company after receiving biochemical augmentations and deployed separately, allowed to utilize MJOLNIR Mark IV powered assault armor instead of the less-durable Semi-Powered Infiltration armor other SPARTAN-IIIs wore. Along with Carter-A259, Emile-A239, and other "handpicked" Spartans, he was not present during Operation: PROMETHEUS, which wiped out all participating SPARTAN-IIIs. He went on to serve throughout the Human-Covenant War as part of several Special Warfare organizations, including the UNSC Army's Special Warfare Group Three. In May of 2552, he participated in counter-insurgency operations on which resulted in his sustaining severe wounds necessitating a lengthy recovery period. As such, he was not present during the Fall of Reach and was cleared for active duty shortly before the Covenant attacked Earth. His actions during the Battle of Earth, though not as sensationalized as those carried out by the remaining SPARTAN-IIs, were enough to distinguish him to the leaders of the UNSC as a warrior on equal footing with the previous SPARTAN generation; as such, he received a personal invitation to became part of the SPARTAN-IV Program from . Aqil easily adapted to the new Spartan branch and reclaimed his old surname, though he continued to use his numerical tag as a means of connecting with other former SPARTAN-IIIs who integrated into S-IV. Aqil's career as a soldier came to a startling end as a result of the Battle of Oth Lodon. Aboard the Infinity, he and many other SPARTANs were preparing for combat when the ship took fire from a Covenant space station equipped with a glassing cannon; in the chaos caused by the damage dealt to the ship, Aqil suffered serious burns and internal organ damage as he attempted to assist endangered crewmen. He was recovered from the wreckage after the battle's conclusion, having blacked out due to intracranial hemorrhage. Complications during surgery meant to stop the bleeding led to a coma lasting several months, and when he awoke he discovered that his motor and speech skills were now impaired from brain damage. Aside from a few minor tics, his intellect remained as sharp as ever and he wasted little energy on lamenting his now-restricted state. By the start of 2559, Aqil had arranged his retirement from the military and set his sights on academic pursuits at the University of Calippus. Though confined to a motorized chair for mobility, the former SPARTAN remained undeterred and had obtained his doctorate in astrophysics by 2566. He continued to work on behalf of the UNSC as a research consultant and devoted his expertise to the growing field of study regarding Forerunner artifacts, and was responsible for establishing a serious approach to the concept of human astroengineering using Forerunner tools as templates. While many colleagues considered his visions of human-built artificial worlds to be folly, he continued to delve into the possibility that humanity might one day truly be able to harness the same power their predecessors wielded. His experiences on the shield world Requiem and other installations fueled his scientific fervor, but were ultimately what doomed him; in a failed attempt to unlock an incomplete Composer's power source, Dr. Nejem accidentally activated its primary function and digitized himself as well as his entire reseach team. Though rumors abounded that he finally sought a way out of his debilitated physical state, the incident was treated as a tragic malfunction and he was commemorated as a hero and a pioneer of science. Category:SPARTAN-IIIs Category:Alpha Company